


Of Smoke and Sugar

by Glass_mermaid



Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Drama, F/M, Grief, Infidelity, Introspection, Light-Hearted, Lust, Moving On, Sex, Trauma, Unhealthy Relationships, introspective Cloud
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-21
Updated: 2020-08-21
Packaged: 2021-03-06 17:55:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 14,269
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26023021
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Glass_mermaid/pseuds/Glass_mermaid
Summary: Calmly, carefully, Cloud Strife starts to put his broken pieces back together.
Relationships: Tifa Lockhart/Cloud Strife, Yuffie Kisaragi/Cloud Strife, Yuffie Kisaragi/Reno
Comments: 7
Kudos: 19





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Originally called Of Treasures and Time on FFN but I took it down years ago. Throwing it back in the ring because I can! An unpopular pairing, but they aren't end game. More like a learning experience for both.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A repost from my old FFN account, long since deleted. I like the darn thing though, so I thought I would repost this unpopular pairing!

\--

He shouldn’t be out here. He shouldn’t be breathing in the cold night air and the scent of wet metal that clung so strongly to this new city. Edge, a grungy, crumpled labyrinth of scaffolding and slapdash buildings. A dim, grim, and surprisingly stirring symbol of hope and the human condition.

He shouldn’t be _anywhere_ really, and the thought is uplifting, new and frighteningly aimless. The world seems done with him for now. The flower girl and his best friend are warm and safe and smiling. The Lifestream has closed another of his chapters. It feels soft somehow. He tilts his head back slightly and tries very, very hard to smile.

The most he can manage is a slight tilt to the corner of his lips, but he isn’t discouraged. He would have to walk before he ran.

Still, he shouldn’t be out on the rooftop. He shouldn’t be listening to the dull and clumsy thud of rubber on concrete. He shouldn’t be wondering why the eternally young and obscenely haphazard Yuffie Kisaragi isn’t inside Seventh Heaven with the others. But his friends have always tried to reach out to him and he knows that his turn to reach back is long overdue.

He carefully skirts around a loose piece of scrap metal that’s been welded over a hole in the roof. His boots are heavy and clap against it, a surprisingly high and tinny sound that disturbs the calm. The thud pauses for a moment, resumes, and he thinks he might have caught the last note of a laugh from the celebration below him.

It makes him pause and reconsider. Perhaps she wants to be alone. But in all the years he’s known her has she ever before?

“Not so glum, chummy chum?” an unrestrained and cheery voice has him lifting his unnaturally blue eyes higher and higher until he’s forced to tip his head back just a bit.

She’s sitting on a raised partition, his head level with her knees. The moonlight is behind her and hides her face in shadow but what the dim city lights can reach of her – a slant across her hips, her skinny and scratched arms, the length of her legs – they highlight. The scars of adventurous living and ninja training are etched into the tight skin that he can see; some wide, some thin, all bleached a paler shade of white by the light. His eyes follow the scraggly, uneven path of a thin white scar before it slides beneath the dark fabric that adds support to her knees. He looks up.

He catches a shine of large, dark eyes and ivory skin against the star struck sea that silhouettes her. She leans back and he loses sight of her face entirely. Her legs resume their meaningless beat, a song of boredom and idle cheer with a note of nervousness hidden loosely behind it.

She doesn’t know how to speak to him. He doesn’t blame her; he doesn't know how to speak to anyone.

He’s been a loner and a drifter for a long time despite the helping hands that forever reached out to him. That thought gives him pause. He knows he shouldn’t be here. There’s no doubt that Tifa will be looking for him soon; beautiful, strong and infinitely devoted Tifa. He shouldn’t be here but Yuffie is his friend as well and he feels as if he should somehow let her know it.

“No,” he finally replies, but she isn’t at all fazed by his long silences. “I’m not.”

That’s not entirely true. It isn’t as easy as he’d like to cast off the cobwebs of clingy memories and fervent regrets. It’s even harder to break old habits. Comfortable habits, he admits, reminding himself that a large part of the silence and secrecy is just who he has become. He is an old habit.

He thinks she nods because he’s still staring up at her shadow and the stars flash briefly against the darkness of her short hair.

“So who sent you out into the dismal dark to collect my magnificent self?” she asks, sounding curious and exasperated at the same time.

“Nobody. I saw you leave,” he says.

“Okay,” she laughs. She doesn’t seem particularly surprised and that confuses him. He feels like he should try to explain – like it is expected of him after so long running from the softer side of love and friendship - but he doesn’t have an explanation to give. He had seen her leaving. He had followed. 

“Are you cold?” he asks her instead, shifting his eyes to the strip of bare skin he can see below her flowered shirt.

“Nah. I’ve been dressing in next to nothing for so many years I think I’m part Shiva!”

He glances down at the display of lanky leg, knotted laces and canvas that dangles before him. 

“Ease of movement,” he murmurs, the understanding of one warrior to another.

“Says a guy wearing more skirts than the princess sitting in front of him,” she snickers.

He shrugs, eyes drifting once again to her skin, and touches the denim of his outfit almost absently. “Less scars,” he says.

She seems to ponder for a moment. He can feel the hurtling of her frenzied thoughts in the gloom.

“I think I like _my_ way better. If you stay the heck out of the range of swords the size of your _entire freaking body_ , you tend to remain intact!”

Her voice raises, arrogance and a giddy kind of delight coating every syllable. She lives to shock and unsettle and her pale legs are abruptly yanked out of his sight as she clambers to her feet and strikes a ridiculous pose above him.

“For I am the Great Ninja Yuffie Kisaragi, the Single White Rose of Wutai, and I greatly enjoy my limbs!”

He looks at her, uncertain as to what she wants him to do with her antics, but she bursts into peals of bright, animated, crashing laughter. It’s a bizarre and beautiful sound to break the stillness.

“Single White Rose?” he asks, solemn and curious.

She throws her lean body back down, a heap of angles and mild curves. He can sense a frown on her face, even though he’s never been particularly perceptive when it came to the moods of either sex.

“Emphasis on single,” she snorts, laughs.

Sensing the thinness of the ice that is suddenly beneath his heavy feet, he attempts to apply a bit of damage control to the situation. He glances at the pale thigh that’s come back to his eye level, recalling an exchange he’d noticed the little ninja having with the wily red-haired Turk. He tries to think of what Tifa would say in this situation and fails utterly.

“You seemed to be… Reno was…” he tries awkwardly, remembering the challenging grin he’d seen her giving the red haired wildcard and his answering sly smirk.

“Reno and me… Me and Reno,” she whispers, a test in the silence that he isn’t quite sure he’s okay with. Does he really trust the Turks with his impetuous friend even after all their help? Even if Rude and Reno had done their part they’d still been _paid_ for it. She’s sneaky and reckless and wayward but there is never any malice behind her ill thought out actions. Yuffie always seems so _new_ to him.

“You know he’s nearly thirty, right?” he asks.

“So?” she laughs. “Our old pal Vincent is like, fifty, give or take a hundred bazillion years and I used to wish he’d give me broody, moody smooches every day.”

“Just making sure,” he shrugs.

For a long moment the quiet becomes uncomfortable. Cloud’s first instinct is to leave before if gets unbearable. He pushes away the urge, tries to relax, frowning and thinking and frowning again. He wants to warn her, he wants to help her, but he’s never known how and she’s so unpredictable.

Tactless and forceful as ever she nudges him hard in the shoulder with her foot to get his attention. He reflexively grabs her ankle. His fingers rest for a moment, feeling the worn rasp of laces and flesh warmed fabric and pausing for a startled, sharp second before falling away. He closes his hands to dismiss the sensation, wishing for his gloves.

“You seem lighter, somehow,” she muses offhandedly. He can feel the sudden weight of her big eyes on him. He wishes he could see her face. Maybe he could follow her scattered thoughts better. “I don’t know, really. I’m not too good with introspection and all that mushy soul searching stuff.”

“I can let go now,” he offers, candid for a moment, a bit of nervous regret pinching him because _she_ isn’t who deserves his honesty after so much painful silence.

But he’s always found it so hard to look into Tifa’s earnest, honest eyes and speak. He’s never understood how she can wear her emotions so nakedly and still remain so strong. Tifa is always looking, waiting, hoping; for things he wants to give her but isn’t sure he even has within him to give anymore. It often overwhelms him and the shadows that hide the girl above him in the dark make words a little easier.

Yuffie’s misguided, clumsy efforts to heal are always directed towards others. She seems to expect little from him. He breathes out. He breathes in.

“Yea?” is all she says, but he can hear the pleased smile in her voice. She’s happy for him, glad for him. The thought makes his tentative smile appear once again.

Behind it come his old shadows, guilt and condemnation, because all his friends have waited for so long, have cared so much, and he’d done nothing to deserve their devotion. Regret is a heavy burden and the weightlessness of redemption is hard for his weary heart to understand. But he _wants_ to. That makes all the difference now.

She knocks away his slowly plunging thoughts when she smacks the soles of her feet on his shoulders and pushes them against him. He decides to ignore the uneasy physical intimacy of their positions, and she doesn’t seem to care at all. He lifts his head, watching her curiously.

“No relapses, you angst junkie,” she chastises loudly.

He looks away. It isn’t easy to let go and he says as much to her. Her feet drop away.

“Nobody ever tried to tell you it was, Cloud,” she cackles, amused by something he can only guess at. “All we can really do is make the best of what we get, and in the end, if we can look back and say _Hell yea! That was totally awesome, especially that part with the kites and the pudding and the cartwheel contests,_ then we’ve done it right!”

“How philosophical,” he deadpans.

If she catches his placid effort at sarcasm she ignores it, because he can see her silhouette nodding wisely.

“I should probably become some kind of mystical, butt kicking ninja sage,” she sighs happily at the stars.

“Will you come down?” he asks her, finally bothered enough by their faceless conversation to ask.

She doesn’t ask him why he wants her to, but flexes her finely toned legs. Instinctively he tenses, and is prepared when she lunges from her perch and uses his broad shoulders as a sort of human stepping-stone. The rubber of her sole grinds uncomfortably into his one unprotected shoulder but she’s light enough and nimble enough that it only lasts a moment. He turns, catching sight of her smoothly landed crouch. A ninja at heart, but only in the air or in combat is she graceful.

As if to prove his inner point, she unfolds her body too quickly from her crouch - legs probably still sore from their extended time against the cold stones - and topples backwards. If she had been anywhere near the edge of the roof he would have moved to catch her, pull her back. As it is, she isn’t, he doesn’t, and she falls clumsily onto her rear end.

His smile grows a bit, even beneath her withering glare.

With a great, elaborate show of injured dignity, she climbs to her feet and brushes herself off, snubbing him for a moment with the tilt of her nose before thoroughly inspecting herself for damage. Years ago during the AVALANCHE days she would have gotten up, bawled her eyes out theatrically and then screamed at him. They’ve all come a long way.

“I hate you, hate you, _hate you_ Cloud Strife!” she yells, planting her hands on her still skinny hips.

And yet they haven’t come far at all.

“No you don’t,” he smiles slightly, shakes his head.

She shrugs, agreeing, and forgets all about her wounded pride. She reaches into one of her many mysterious pockets and pulls out a brightly colored pack of gum. She unwraps a thick square, pops it in her mouth, and works her jaws loudly. He can smell the sugary pinkness of it even though he stands a few steps away from her. She tears another piece away from the stack and whips it at him. He catches it in a remarkable display of reflexes, but if she’s impressed she hides it well. Cloud wonders, absently, if she was at all surprised by his second triumph against the remnants of Sephiroth. He had heard from Vincent that she’d pouted for hours over the missed chance to see her substantial materia collection in better action. She’d never had her priorities overly straight.

Looking down at the gum in his hand for a thoughtful moment, he unwraps it and places it on his tongue. He looks over to see Yuffie watching him approvingly. He’s pleased that he can finally see her face, and takes a second to examine it from the the thick fringe of her black lashes to the tiny tip of her chin as if reassessing her for trouble. 

She smirks as if she knows what he’s thinking even when he doesn’t and he can see Reno’s sudden influence in her face. It unsettles him, just a bit.

“Check me out,” she commands, and beneath his relatively bland gaze, proceeds to blow a large, sticky bubble.

It pops abruptly, and her mouth works to quickly retrieve the deflated mess. He’s never learned how to do that particular trick nor does he care to learn. Though he finds that he is enjoying the taste of the sugar on his tongue as well as watching Yuffie make a spectacle of herself.

“Are you suitably impressed with my amazing talents?” she queries, flashing him a brilliant grin of white teeth and pink lips that makes him realize abruptly, a bolt out of the blue, that he knows what she’d taste like at this exact moment.

He shouldn’t be wondering that. _Ever_. He can feel his good mood slipping away as guilt and discomfort pour in. She must sense the same because she blinks at him, confused, sobers and gestures towards the exit off the roof of the bar.

“Let’s blow this popsicle stand!” she bellows, leading the way, and if she knew what he was thinking for that flash of a moment, she doesn’t let on.

When they go back inside he offers up his hesitant smile to his makeshift family, comforted by the surprised pleasure his meager gift gives the two children and Tifa. A lanky, red-haired Turk immediately catches Yuffie's eyes and there is something charged and wild between them even when Yuffie pointedly turns her back and proceeds to drape herself all over the card game Cid and Barrett were in the middle of playing much to their annoyance. Reno watches her with narrowed eyes. 

Cloud shouldn’t be watching either of them so he pretends he isn’t.

He wonders what the pang within him is. Introspection is still something new and strange to him.

Instead, he just tries to smile once again and turns back to the table of his friends. It will get easier.

\--


	2. Chapter 2

\--

Cloud shuts the narrow side door of the tiny garage behind him, flicking on the light switch as he passes by. He tucks the small folder he has to deliver into his back pocket as he moves towards Fenrir.

The first indication he has that somebody has tampered with his motorcycle is the door itself. He never leaves it open and Marlene and Denzel know not to go inside the garage.

The second is a small, smudged fingerprint on the shiny finish above the throttle. Thoughtful, he touches a gloved hand to the print and glances around. Nothing catches his eye, no movement, no sound. He pauses, waiting patiently.

“Gawd, do you ever do things faster than Reluctant Snail Pace?”

Unsurprised to hear the pouting, girlish voice, he sees the tiny ninja unfold from what must have been a hastily acquired hiding spot behind his large bike. He looks at her blankly, wondering how she’d intended to get out of that one. 

“Tifa said you were in town,” he says.

“Don’t seem so surprised,” she snorts. “Some of my friends actually like to see me.”

“I like to see you,” he says, though he doesn’t all the time.

She’s so loud, so energetic, so overwhelmingly in love with life in a way that always shocks. It's like asking for a sip of lemonade and having the whole lemon shoved in your mouth.

“Anyway,” she says, and her eyes are devouring his bike. “I know you were lying around last night wondering how you could make my life better, and than you reached an incredible, blinding epiphany… _I will let Yuffie ride my motorcycle next time she stops by with her delightful self._ Lucky for you, my psychic powers are starting to grow and I got your message and came running!”

“Sorry, Yuffie, no,” he murmurs as swings his leg over the wide seat and settles down.

She peers at him, eyes wide and calculating. He gazes back at her levelly, slightly taken aback by how close she is to his face.

“Cloud,” she says gravely, “if you let me ride Fenrir, I will have your chocobo-headed Wutaian ninja babies.”

He gives her a small smile, amused.

“Tempting, but no.”

She seems to ponder for a moment, face scrunching thoughtfully before she lifts her hand and shows him the black square resting in her palm.

“I’ll give you back your wallet,” she offers craftily.

He raises an eyebrow and holds out his hand expectantly.

“You’ll do that anyway,” he sighs.

She grudgingly complies before dramatically flopping herself half over the back of his bike. She knows he won’t move it with her lying there, and she doesn’t plan on letting him move it at _all_ without her.

Cloud eyes the girl uncertainly over his shoulder

“Where’s Tifa?” he asks.

“She eloped with Denzel,” Yuffie sighs idly. “You should have seen it; they skipped off into the sunset wearing togas and paper hats and everything…”

“Oh?” he smiles slightly.

“Yea, I’m heartbroken, but they offered you up as the consolation prize. You’re not as manly and sophisticated and suave as Denzel but I suppose you’ll do in a pinch.”

“Good to know,” Cloud mutters, turning back to the front.

“So, where’s Vincent? I thought he was staying for a few days but I went to see him and his room was all _his-physical-manifestation-is-absent-and-his-brooding-aura-of-quiet-doom-is-all-that-remains…_ ” she whispers dramatically.

“You speak to walls now?” he asks as he toys absently with Fenrir’s throttle.

“Uh huh,” she smiles, he can hear it in her voice, “and right now they’re telling me that you’re trying to avoid my question. Which you suck at, by the way.”

“Thank you,” he huffed.

“Anytime! Now, where is the man in red?”

Turning and meeting her eyes, Cloud says, “He eloped with Marlene.”

Laughing delightedly, Yuffie flips her nimble body around until she’s arching over the back, seemingly unaware of how awkward and painful her position looks to him.

“Total grossness!” she cackles, “besides, Marlene is way too cool for Vincent! I know he can’t do cartwheels, he doesn’t sing on his voicemail message, and I bet he doesn’t even know how to mix a Two Wutaian Turtles!”

Cloud looks at her questioningly and she leans upward, waggling her eyebrows.

“The secret is in the cherry,” she whispers loudly.

“Yuffie,” he murmurs, pained, “I need to know if I’ve got any more deliveries.”

Thinking hard, Yuffie bites her lip. “She did leave a message. Something about letting me ride your bike?”

At his frustrated glare, she waves her hands and unwinds herself from Fenrir.

“Alright! She told me to let you know that Barrett called and asked her to come visit him with Marlene, and he wanted to know if you want to come so think about it… and also, the delivery to Kalm was cancelled.”

“Okay,” he says.

He watches her as she scurries in front of his bike, popping a square of gum into her mouth. When she sees him watching her steadily, she sticks out her tongue, the pink wad of candy placed square in the middle. He winces, giving her a look.

As if it were a peace offering, she slides another square along the shiny lacquer of the motorcycle, gesturing to him eagerly until he picks it up. He recalls the utterly _pink_ flavor of it from the last time she gave him some, and smiles slightly before putting it in his pocket.

He looks at her, finding her staring back at him.

Cloud pauses for a moment, hesitant, before he pulls on his goggles and starts the engine.

“Let’s go,” he orders.

Yuffie’s jaw drops and she hastily tosses herself behind him on the bike, squirming and clumsy and quick.

“Alright! Where are we going?”

“You wanted a ride,” he says.

She whoops loudly, right in his ear, but he smirks even as he winces.

“This way I won’t have to liberate it from your evil clutches,” she grins.

A sudden thought grabs him. “Put your arms around my waist,” he commands.

She obliges without any apparent discomfort, throwing her long arms around him and making him realize that she’s scooting closer instead of sitting higher on the back. He startles, blinking but keeping his stare forward. The heat of her thighs wrapped around his hips is awkward to say the least and he wonders if this was a bad idea. Most of his spontaneous ones were.

The ninja’s cheerful voice makes him shake off his uncomfortable thoughts as she slaps his back and urges him to get moving.

“Go go go!” she hollers.

He huffs slightly, pressing the button that raises the garage door, amused by her impatience as she kicks her feet against his calves and moans that it’s taking forever. He revs, deliberately baiting her before taking off like a shot into the streets of Edge. She squeals, shrieking with laughter like a child, and he quickly loses himself to the road.

\--

They’re stopped at a light when he feels her stiffen and her sudden chortle of evil laughter brushes his ear. There’s a sharp crack in his ear and he realizes that she’s just blown a large, sticky bubble uncomfortably close to his hair.

“Hey Turkey!” she bellows, and he shifts his head away and glances momentarily to his right to see Reno and Rude walking down the sidewalk. At Yuffie’s shrill voice the redhead stiffens, his eyes searching for her with a furtive intensity Cloud doesn’t particularly like.

Reno catches sight of him, halting sharply and seeming to reel slightly backwards. As if to taunt him, Yuffie tightens her arms around Cloud’s back, presses so close that her hip bones push into him. Rude simply watches the spectacle.

The light turns red, and uncertainly, Cloud floors it, unable to meet Reno’s sharp eyes. He can’t see her but he knows that Yuffie is smirking triumphantly at the redhead and it makes him realize that whatever attraction had been blooming between the two after the Sephiroth remnants had been defeated had clearly not ended that night at the bar.

Yuffie is craning her neck backward, her eyes fastened to the Turk until they whip around a corner and are lost from sight.

\--

For a long time there is only silence and Cloud, unsure of where to take her, just keeps driving. He feels completely in control when he drives Fenrir. The roaring of the engines keep thought at bay and if there’s one thing he needs to do less of, it’s think. Eventually the city begins to break around them, more and more flat countryside appearing until they leave the dingy buildings far behind.

Silence and carpets of yellow flowers are all that keep them company for a long, easy time.

Finally he stops, foot anchoring them to the paved ground. He takes his goggles off, puts them in his pocket and fingers the solid square of bubblegum he remembers is there.

“We should head back soon,” he says.

“Not yet,” she cajoles, hopping off from behind him.

The wind quickly steals the lingering warmth of her body heat from his back.

“I want to get some of these silly little flowers for Tifa. She likes this kind of girly stuff now and then,” she says, peering at him pointedly. "You know, 'cause she's a girl." 

Cloud glances around him, taking note of the low-lying patches of scraggly yellow flowers; the type found almost anywhere on Planet. If anything he’d call them weeds but he doesn’t bother telling Yuffie. Instead, he thinks of Tifa, of yellow, of silence and wind, and watches the ninja throw her lithe body into the task of shoving together an ugly bundle of thin grass, clumpy gold flowers and tattered greens. He thinks of reedy, tousled Reno and his narrowed blue eyes.

She finally returns to his side, shoving the sad bouquet at him with a proud grin.

“I don’t know flowers,” she chuckles, “but I do know ugly, and this thing takes the ugly cake.”

Cloud looks at her carefully.

“What was that with Reno back there?” he asks bluntly.

Her arm falls to her side, bouquet held in her limp fist. She tilts her head to the side as if she has to think for a moment about what he’s referring to, but the darkness in her eyes tells him she’s well aware.

“What was what?” she shrugs innocently.

“You know what,” he says, a hint of authority tinting his voice like the old days.

Yuffie’s eyes narrow rebelliously.

“Just staying one step ahead,” she says, and the mutiny in her eyes clears away.

Cloud doesn’t like feeling used but there is little he can do about it now. He frowns and as if she senses his irritation she tenses than melts into her usual boneless tangle of limbs. She grins, tilts her head girlishly, and tries to charm him. He realizes with an uncomfortable jerk that he isn’t immune.

She cracks a joke, hoping to make him smile and so he offers her a weak one just to make her stop. Seeing her capering coyly is making him uncomfortable. He likes Yuffie, she’s a trusted comrade and friend... But when he opened himself even to a small degree he had only intended Tifa to come in.

“You look ready to chew off your own arm,” she says, halting and peering at him closely.

He swallows a bite of panic, shakes his head as if to clear away his thoughts, and says the first thing that comes to mind.

“Those flowers smell terrible,” he mumbles, gesturing to the fields.

She blinks stupidly for a moment before bursting into peals of ungainly, clanging laughter. There is very little about her that Cloud can call gentle but she seems to take pity on him, swings her leg back over the bike and puts her hand on his waist. She tosses the bouquet away before slapping that hand against him as well, and he cranes his neck around to give her a questioning look.

“It’s the thought that counts,” she grins.

Confused, Cloud starts the ignition and slams on the speed. She shrieks wildly in his ear, bouncing a bit against him in her seat, and he sighs, gives in and decides not to worry about flowers, about skinny bodies, about Tifa, about redheads, about sins and souls and certainties… Later he could fret and flounder in the confusing mire of his own ever morose thoughts.

For now, he was just going to enjoy the ride.

\--


	3. Chapter 3

“It’s a big one, Cloud. I wouldn’t ask for your help otherwise,” Reeve chuckles, but there’s a nerve in his voice that Cloud instantly detects.

“I know,” he says calmly, and still feels resentful.

“Vincent has the mission details. I don’t know what I was thinking,” he says and Cloud can hear a teasing smile overlapping the faint tension in his voice. “You two chatterboxes probably won’t get any work done!”

He hangs up, leaving Cloud to listen to the dead air for a moment before doing the same. For a second he studies the toes of his boots, wondering why he can never say no to those who ask things of him. Wondering at the strange tingle of anticipation, of blood-lust thrumming through him. Wondering if he’ll ever be done saving the world. Wondering if he’ll ever want to be done.

He thinks of Tifa and the unhappiness and worry that will mar her face when he tells her that he’s going to be leaving for a while. She will want to come but he won’t let her. If nothing else, he’ll have to play on her instinct to nurture. Somebody has to stay and look after Marlene and Denzel. They can’t risk losing both impromptu guardians and leaving the children alone once again in a world that never seems to aid its vulnerable.

It’s her again. Yuffie. He knows it even though Reeve didn't say it.

Cloud wraps his gloved hands around his PHS and blindly studies the floor, thinking.

Just thinking.

\--

The WRO helicopter that dropped them off is quickly lost to the snow and white skies. They watch it go, listening to the steady throb of the blades until it to disappears.

“Her PHS signal was lost in this region,” Vincent says stonily, and his red eyes are already scanning the snow-laden area. “We have heard nothing for over a day.”

“What was she doing out here?” Cloud asks quietly.

He doesn’t want to be here, listening to the eerie scream of wind and snow across the tundra. He hates the wet chill that seeps under the clothes and into the bone and the dank, craggy rocks that jut out of the snow like crumbling, rotten teeth. It’s a lonely place, an ugly place.

Vincent continues to survey their surroundings, finally pointing to one of the dark, damp cave entrances in the distance. They begin to slog forward through the deep snow and are halfway to their destination when the crimson clad man deigns to speak.

“The Icicle Inn has had several rumors of missing persons in the area and there were reports of a Dark Dragon getting too close to civilian populated areas.”

“And Yuffie?” Cloud asks, blinking rapidly as sharp flakes of ice catch on his lashes. The cold stings his lungs.

“Was doing her job, gathering information so that Reeve would decide if this was an WRO situation or if he should be delegating the task to professional monster hunters.”

Pausing, Vincent takes out his PHS and checks the signal before showing the display to Cloud. The signal is not full but it’s still strong. He meets Vincent’s eyes, questioning.

“She is to report to Reeve and myself once a day. She has missed two,” the dark man says.

Cloud feels his stomach clench unpleasantly with concern. He wants to know why Reeve failed to mention that this was a potential rescue mission and not a monster hunt. He wants to know why her name never came up.

The sudden silence when they enter the mouth of the cavern after the wailing of the wind is unnerving. He can hear his heavy breathing and see his own frosted breath in the air. The clink of his belts and chains is shrill in the hush. Yuffie shouldn’t be here, so far from help with strong, angry monsters swarming the area. He shoots Vincent a look and bites back the rebuke that is pushing on his tongue. He knows his anger is misdirected.

“So she’s been missing for at least one day?” he asks instead.

Vincent nods. “More or less.”

They continue on, their footsteps as loud as gunfire in the silence. Cloud keeps a wary hand on his sword but few monsters worth fighting challenge them. They find a sign that their friend has come this way when they see a tiny footprint in the wet grit of the cavern floor. Vincent halts, retrieves his PHS once again, and shows Cloud the still steady signal.

Cloud cannot decide if he is worried yet.

\--

They reach a wide, shallow basin, the only path one that includes climbing. The remnants of a tiny camp are set up and Vincent has just knelt to test the warmth of the ashes in the old fire when a strident, girlish voice rings out.

“Oh, you horrible, insensitive, big, dumb, brooding _menace_ you!”

Her angry shout is so abrupt and sudden when it echoes over the rocky walls that Vincent has to jerk his weapon upright and away from the girl. She seems completely oblivious to what could have been a bullet wound as she scales lightly down one of the sloping, craggy walls all big boots, fiery eyes and shivering skin. Her mouth is a tight line, her eyebrows drawn down into a fierce glare. Perhaps if she had been taller she might have looked intimidating but when she gets close enough to Vincent to shove a finger into his chest and start scolding him, she barely comes up to his chest.

“Three days!” she is saying, voice shrill and sharp. “The standard time for operative retrieval is _three_ days, Vincent! What are you doing here _now_?”

Cloud notices that she reels back when she catches sight of him, shooting the gunner a disbelieving look of indignant fury.

“He brought _Cloud_ into this? Not only did Reeve make me seem like a totally incompetent _loser_ by immediately assuming I was helpless and sending in the big guns, but he pressed the freaking _panic button_ of our planet and brought in the biggest gun of them all?!”

Vincent is noticeably unrepentant.

“Many of our largest problems have stemmed from the Northern Crater. When taken into consideration he thought it prudent to act quickly.”

Yuffie turns her defiant glare on Cloud, props her hands on her hips and sticks out her tongue.

“If you two mother hens would have waited – _as is mission protocol, Vincent_ – I would have been back at Icicle Inn drinking hot chocolate and reporting to Mister act-first-follow-rules-later Reeve while you stared at walls or ate bugs or whatever it is you do when you’re not trying to _baby-sit_ me!”

She levels a halfhearted kick at Vincent’s shin, shooting him a dirty look when he doesn’t even flinch.

“Why,” he asks impassively, “did you not call in on time?”

Yuffie’s cheeks flare red and she withdraws a severely crushed PHS from her back pocket, the once sleek little device a tangle of cracked plastic and metal. Cloud notices that she doesn’t meet Vincent’s eyes. She was never very good at lying to her friends and he supposes he should be grateful because she can lie through her teeth to just about everyone and anyone else.

“It got smashed,” she says quickly.

“By?” Vincent asks.

“By a monster,” she shrugs evasively, stuffing it away again. “There _are_ a few of those around here, you know!”

“Yuffie,” Vincent says tightly, and Cloud knows he’s missing something important in this conversation. “Standard solo mission protocol, as you are fond of reciting, clearly states that you are to signal immediately prior to an engagement with an enemy.”

“Unless,” she wheedles, waggling a finger in the air, “you’re taken by surprise!”

“Were you taken by surprise?” he asks stonily.

“No,” she sulks.

“I see,” Vincent says, and Yuffie looks contrite. “Did you complete your objective?”

Kicking petulantly at the ground with her grubby boot, Yuffie rolls her eyes. For the first time, Cloud takes in the less than pristine conditions of her appearance. Though she is wearing state of the art snow gear - goggles, toque, gloves, and even a pair of fur lined boots - she defeats the purpose by still wearing her ridiculous shorts. All of it is smudged with grit and grime. The bare skin, that of her thighs and face, is wind chapped and chill. There is dried blood on her cheek though her materia seems to have taken care of the cut.

“I’m the Great Ninja Yuffie Kisaragi! Of course I did!”

“What happened to you?” Cloud asks and doesn’t bother hiding his disquiet.

To his surprise, Yuffie turns to him and grins, punching her fist in the air, though it lacks its usual energy. She looks tired.

“It was a Dark Dragon just like we thought! It must have wandered too close to the Icicle Inn and discovered it had some pretty tasty people snacks so it decided to come back for more. I tracked it to these caves and saved Reeve the trouble of sending somebody out here to take care of it.”

Cloud blinks, startled to feel a bit of anxious anger wash over him. He watches her as she begins to fiddle idly with the strap of her goggles.

“You took a Dark Dragon on alone?” he asks, mouth thinning.

“Sure did, Spikes,” she frowns peevishly, glancing at him from beneath her lowered lashes as if she senses his concern and couldn’t care less, “and you know what? I could have taken on a few more.”

Cloud feels as if she is mocking them for caring about her and his insides clench angrily. Beside him, Vincent shakes his dark head.

Eyes hard, the gunner turns to leave. “I do not know,” he says, “whether your shameless bravado is a result of youth, stupidity or both.”

Cloud doesn’t know what to say and so he says nothing, but turns and follows Vincent out. Yuffie halts for a moment and he can feel her eyes on his back, before she falls into line and scurries after them. She doesn’t speak again, but her silence is sullen, mutinous. Hurt.

\--

They get a room for the night at Icicle Inn, and because the wounded tension still hums through them there is no rush to retire to the single room stuffed full of close bed. Vincent moves off and withdraws his PHS, no doubt to call and report to Reeve. Yuffie gives his back a resentful glare, flushing tetchily when she sees Cloud observing her.

He moves to the innkeeper and pays for their stay and out of the corner of his eye he sees Yuffie pressing a PHS close to her ear and sliding out of the room. He touches his pocket and sure enough, his is gone. Frowning he moves after her, catching Vincent’s eyes and nodding in the girl’s direction. He is careful to make sure his belts do not rattle, his buckles do not clink, but he doesn’t ask himself why. He glances around the corridor and though he doesn’t see her he can hear her frustrated voice.

“…That’s just it,” she whines, “there _was_ no trouble! Three days. Three. It hasn’t even been a full two and Reeve sent in the cavalry.”

A moment of silence falls as she listens, Cloud stares intently at the floorboards.

“Oh, real funny. Know what I did? I totally wiped the floor with a Dark Dragon.”

He can hear her pacing.

“At least _somebody_ has a little faith in me.”

Cloud swallows the immediate denial and irritation blooms in its place. What her friends might lack in faith they make up for in forbearance.

“… Yea, just a bit. I had plenty of Cura and besides, I’m the quickest thing on two legs and you know it!”

She laughs, cocky and self-assured once more. The silence lengthens for a moment, pregnant, and when she speaks again it is with an edge of excitement in her tone.

“Yes!”

Her voice is playful now. There is an air of anticipation in her tread and he frowns.

“Bells? All right. You can string them through your luxurious ruby man tresses.”

He knows the man she’s talking to. He’s known all along. He touches a gloved hand to the wall he knows she stands behind. He wishes he could stop her from making so many mistakes.

“Soon,” she laughs, and Cloud feels a tired numbness settling over him.

He wishes he could just wash his hands of her, of them all. Just let him worry about her, or at least not give a damn if he doesn't. It isn’t his job to try and protect everyone, over and over and over. He’s afraid he might fail again if he tries.

\--

When she skips back into the main room of the inn, she dashes over to the counter with a smile on her face before she comes to Cloud and Vincent where they sit silently before the fire. She is carefully juggling three steaming mugs of hot cocoa in her hands and she places them on the low table.

“I come bearing gifts!” she states proudly, blowing lightly on her scalded fingers.

“Thank you,” Vincent says quietly.

“Yea,” Cloud adds and still feels sour.

He risks looking at her, glad for once of her selfish and preoccupied nature because she doesn’t read anything in his stare even though there is a storm behind it. She is bouncing on her heels, eyes bright and merry and a thousand kinds of trouble. With a wink in his direction she tosses him his phone. Cloud catches it in his lap.

“I made all kinds of naughty calls to sexy phone lines,” she jokes, “and I totally billed them to Vincent’s WRO account.”

She throws herself heavily into another of the cushy chairs warmed by the fire, sinking boneless and limp into its depths with her skinny legs stretched out.

“Yep, Reeve’s jaw is going to unhinge when he gets _that_ bill,” she sighs contentedly, and eyelashes flutter like shadows over her cheeks for a long moment as she shuts her eyes.

Cloud takes his mug and sips it carefully. He glances back to Vincent who returns his gaze, stands, and nods his head in farewell. Now there is only the two of them before the fire and Cloud keeps his eyes fastened to the snapping flames.

“He gone?” she asks, cracking open one eye.

“Yes,” Cloud replies. “To bed, I guess.”

“More for me!”

Giggling greedily she lunges forward and snags the second mug, setting it beside her own. She hefts one up to her mouth and tips her head back. When she puts the mug back down, there is a smear of whipped cream on her upper lip and she waggles her eyebrows at him suggestively.

“Do I remind you of anyone?” she teases.

“Not really,” he says sullenly.

She rolls her eyes and wipes the back of her hand over her face. “You are the worst guesser ever and for always. I was going for the Bugenhagen look!”

She finishes off the first mug, slurping loudly before setting it aside and picking up the second. This one, she takes with her as she settles down into her chair, cupping her long-fingered hands around it. Cloud returns his gaze to the fire, and for a time their silence is almost companionable. He feels his sense of betrayal lessening as the heat of the room soaks into his skin with his friend safely in sight. He hesitantly sips his cocoa.

When he finally looks at Yuffie again she is breathing deeply and evenly, eyelids closed and mouth parted. When he notices her hands are lax and her mug is perilously close to tipping into her lap, he sets his own down and stands, leaning over her and moving to take it from her grasp. Her hands tense and he glances upward, finding himself close enough to see the flicker of uncertainty behind in her gaze. The thick fringe of her lashes sweeps down as she blinks tiredly and he notices that there is a tiny scar etched into her cheekbone. Her eyes are dark, so dark they seem black, and the firelight flickering back in reflection makes him realize there might be a danger here he had never noticed.

He feels a desperate urge to brush away the lock of dark hair sliding gently down her face and jerks away.

He goes to stand and her mouth opens.

“I’m sorry,” she says softly.

He freezes mid motion, back immediately protesting the awkward bend in his spine.

“For?”

“I didn’t mean to make everyone worry,” she whispers.

Cloud blinks, glancing away for a long moment. Carefully, he takes the mug from her hands and nods. He sets it on the table.

“We know. I’m going to bed,” he murmurs.

“Alright,” she says uncertainly.

He doesn’t look back as he leaves the main room and heads up the stairs to bed. A part of him doesn’t dare.

\--

A swiftly hushed giggle is what wakes him up and disoriented for a moment by the shadow blurred surrounding he clutches instinctively for his sword. He realizes where he is when his hand is firmly wrapped around the handle and he relaxes.

Sitting up slowly, he swings his legs off the bed and glances over at Vincent’s still form. His cloak is the color of old blood in the pooling moonlight and the brightness of the snow doesn’t quite make it inside.

Another giggle; high and familiar as it tickles faintly against his ears.

Hesitantly, he stands and checks the other beds for Yuffie before approaching the frosty windowpanes where he knows he’ll find her. Sure enough, he catches sight of her thin silhouette in that array of dirty winter gear. Beside her stands a man, his long red hair burning like embers against the cold white. In the shadows he looks thin and reedy and skeletal. Cloud wonders how he got there so quickly before recalling the Shinra helicopter and the pilot’s penchant for breaking rules.

Reno is holding a long stick and Yuffie laughs again as he scratches symbols into the powdery drifts. She snatches it from him and adds her own, crouching down like a child in the sand to etch whatever secrets she has in the snow. She tosses aside the stick and Reno surveys her handiwork for a moment. Cloud sees him shrug, and the flash of his pale teeth in the gloom as he grins.

She hurtles upward and throws her arms around his neck and even though she stands on her tiptoes Reno has to tip his head down to meet her eager lips. Cloud draws away from the window and quickly retreats back to his bed. The sheets cling to him, frigid and no comfort at all. He shifts, turning his tired body over and shifting his arm under the pillow. His hand hits something small, and wrapping his fingers around it he withdraws a square of pink gum, the strong candy smell making his head throb. A thank you. An apology.

He shuts his eyes tightly; hand fisted around the gum, and her soft peals of laughter follow him down through his spiral of sleep.

\--

Cloud clomps downstairs, tired and rumpled, massive sword slung over his back and ready to go. Vincent sweeps over to him, tilting his head towards the Innkeeper.

“Ungrateful girl,” he murmurs. “She left last night. There was a message with the innkeeper. Something about _secret ninja business_.”

She was never very good at lying to her friends but this time he’s not grateful. Cloud shrugs, catching sight of the shared knowledge in Vincent’s scarlet gaze. He wonders how much he to had heard last night. He wonders what else Vincent has seen.

“Did you call Cid?” he asks.

“Yes,” Vincent replies. “He’ll be here shortly.”

Nodding, the blonde moves quietly past Vincent and outside. The air is so startlingly cold that his face begins to redden and ache in moments and he blinks his eyes rapidly in an attempt to adjust to the painful brightness. His steps carry him through the snow around the building, the only sound in the still morning air that of the crunch of his heavy boots.

He finds the spot in the snow where Yuffie and Reno had carved their messages but fresh powder has left nothing but the gentle slopes and hollows of their secrets and new footprints have crushed the mystery.

Brushing away some ice, Cloud sits on a low bench and follows the lost patterns with his eyes. He catches sight of the branch they’d used peeking out of the white and leans down, picking it up and shaking the snow off. It smells of wet wood and dirt, of earth and pine and promises. He pauses for a moment before standing.

When he leaves, there is his own solitary emblem engraved carefully into the snow.

\--


	4. Chapter 4

\--

Cloud hears her shouting his name through the milling throngs of Costa Del Sol, managing to bellow so stridently that he halts with his leg half thrown over his motorcycle and glances around. He lifts the goggles from his eyes and finds her waving madly, leaping as high as she can to get above the crowd and win his attention. He stops, waiting until she gets to him before offering her a mild greeting in reply.

“Yuffie,” is all he says.

“For a guy who walks like he’s got nowhere to go, you sure can mosey!” she gasps, leaning over her knees and heaving air for a moment.

“Sorry,” he replies, smiling slightly at her theatrics.

“What are you doing here?” she demands, then stands and grins widely. “There are _people_ here, or hadn’t you noticed? I’d make some head-in-the-clouds joke but I’m way too sophisticated for that.”

“Yea,” he speaks ruefully, looking her over.

She’s bouncing on her heels, hair curving ever so slightly against the smoothness of her flushed cheeks, eyes gleaming with delight at this unexpected encounter. She’s still willow thin and jittering with overabundant energy but it fits her better then it ever has before.

He isn’t above noticing she looks good but he feels bitter because of it. Cheated somehow, because it’s apparent that she can do very well without any of them around while the rest of them seem to wither and waste away without the others to fill them up. Himself, Tifa, Barrett, even Cid and Shera. They circle one another as the years go by, clinging like castaways on a raft afraid of the waters beneath. She's happy enough to swim alone. 

“Where have you been?”

He hadn’t meant for a note of condemnation to color his voice; it just slips out. She blinks, looking startled, but whether it is due to his candor or not, he isn’t sure.

“Around,” she shrugs. “Wherever the wind takes me and all that.”

“Oh,” he frowns.

He toys with his goggles for a moment. He silently places them in his pocket.

“What about you? Why are you so far from home?” she asks curiously.

Cloud glances away, shrugs. He has accepted some delivery orders that take him off the other continent, some of which will take days on end to complete. He tells himself that he isn’t trying to run away from long black hair and from gentle smiles. From understanding and acceptance and devotion. From sour tears behind a sweet smile.

“Work,” he offers, gesturing lamely to Fenrir.

She stares at him for a moment, and he knows she doesn’t believe him at all. He finds it disconcerting, uncomfortable. Usually only Tifa can see through his poker face. She lets the moment go and he is thankful.

“You look good enough,” she sighs gustily, seemingly satisfied by what she sees in him.

She steps closer, so close that he can smell the warmth of her skin and the clean scent of her hair. She leans closer still, peers at his face. He blinks.

“Trouble in paradise?” she asks, only half joking.

“Something like that,” he shrugs and he can’t help but look guiltily away.

He turns his eyes back, again taking in her cheerful eyes, the sheen of her hair and the smooth lines of her slender body.

“So do you,” he adds, disconcerted by the uplifting energy of her. “Look good, I mean.”

“Of course,” she giggles, than announces, “Since you’re here, you’re going to be graced with the sheer delight of my amazing company.”

Cloud feels a pang of nervousness, a tingle of disappointment. “I can’t, I’ve got to get these deliveries started.”

“Not without these,” she sings, and holds up his goggles.

Cloud has never been able to comprehend how sticky and quick her fingers are. He feels his empty pocket, looks at her, and swings his leg over the bike. He’s mildly startled when she doesn’t back away and as he stretches to his full, admittedly modest height, she peers up at him so close he can see a light speckling of summer freckles running over her nose.

“Yuffie,” he commands, “I need those.”

Though if he truly wanted to escape her, he did not.

“Than give me some of your time,” she says simply, dangling the goggles from her small fingers well within his reach.

He is less surprised than she is when he agrees to her straightforward request.

\--

Again he asks her where she’s been and she sighs, evasive and cagey in a way he didn't count on.

“I was getting buried by WRO stuff,” she admits. “I just wanted some time away. That reminds me! If you get a call from Reeve, you haven’t seen me.”

“I’ve already had a few,” he tells her honestly.

She looks irritated, ashamed. There isn’t anything he can do for her.

“What does Tifa think of you wandering so far from Edge?” she asks, derailing his vaguely frustrated thoughts.

He thinks of the knowing, sad eyes of the dark haired beauty, his friend, his companion, the woman he loves but can never bring himself to have. She hadn’t understood – he knows she hadn’t – but she’d looked at him and smiled her understanding smile. He had forced himself to ignore the wispy, tired sorrow that had lay beneath it, becoming more and more bared as the years trickled by.

One step forward, one step back. Every time he felt that they were reaching a point, a pinnacle, in their relationship and perhaps finding out how to fit together – loner and lover – he would feel the overwhelming urge to back away and panic.

They were no closer than they had ever been and he could sense the growing frustration in Tifa’s gentle, kind smiles. She was so strong, and so devoted, and so selfless. Perhaps if she gave herself half the consideration she gave him he wouldn’t feel so trapped by everything good that she was.

“She doesn’t like it,” he says and avoids her eyes. “She never will.”

Yuffie punches him in the arm, startling him from his desolate thoughts. He focuses on her, absent eyes sharpening and her fisted hand loosens, becomes a clumsy, fond touch on his shoulder.

“You okay?” she asks.

“Always,” he says pensively, and means never.

They continue walking and after a while he notices that her eyes are constantly, stealthily skimming the crowd. He watches her, knowing.

“Looking for somebody?” he asks quietly.

“Never,” she says sharply, and means always.

\--

They’re standing on the beach that night, and he's listening to the steady roll of the waves and feeling the bite of the brisk wind wash over him. He is still and silent, simple. She is edgy and moving, complicated.

“I have to go back to Wutai,” she shrugs into the dark without preamble. “Dad’s no spring chicken anymore. He’s tubby and old and gray and he needs more and more help with all that boring political mumbo jumbo. I’m going to have to, you know, take charge soon.”

Cloud doesn’t know what to say to her and he can tell that she knows it by the smirk dancing over her lips as she glances his way.

“You’ll be great,” he offers lamely.

She snorts, cocking a brow at him saucily. “Like I need _you_ to tell me that! I’m great at everything and its brother!”

“I’ll tell you anyway,” he shrugs and for a second she looks grateful and terrified, proud and flattered, uncertain and wistful all at once.

It disappears in the darkness of her eyes and she waggles her eyebrows then kicks sand over his boots. He retaliates weakly, much to her delight, and she lets out a laughing protest before stepping backwards.

Something catches her eye and she stills, sobering. Her eyes linger on the ground and he follows her gaze to a single cigarette butt half buried in the sand.

Yuffie blinks, sees him looking, and her laughter is a small, dismissive trill lost to the roar of the water.

“He’s looking for me,” she blurts out, defiant.

“Why are you running?” he murmurs.

She arches a brow, placing a hand on her hip and shifting slightly.

“Running?” she scoffs weakly. “Not likely.”

“What than?” he asks her, demanding her for answers he has no right to know.

She looks tiny and pale beneath the moonlight, staring first at the waves then him, defiant and uncertain and fearless.

“If I let him catch me,” she says slowly, “he’ll turn and run.”

Cloud puzzles for a moment, watching her black hair catch and swirl in the wind, feeling the sting of salt in his eyes. Finally he nods, distantly understanding the red haired Turk and feeling sorry for it.

“What happens when he finds you?” he asks despite not truly wanting to know.

He likes having her here, alone and contemplative in the sharp salted air of the sea. She seems otherworldly and strange and a part of him would like to believe that this is a side of her that nobody knows.

“We fight, I cry,” she bites her lip, gazing inward. “He asks me to stop, we break down, we make love, we fight, and when he falls asleep I run again,” she shrugs, smiling sadly. “I cry again.”

There's an understanding between them that he knows they both feel, a strength in knowing that they both are runners when it comes to romance. He can see her freckles in the moonlight, tiny little starbursts like her very own constellations written messily on her skin. He fights an urge to touch her, to let her know that he feels it to and that maybe they don't have to be sorry anymore for being what they are. He swallows back so many words he will never be able to say out loud. 

Instead he says nothing, watching her shiver in the cold wind, and when he steps forward and kisses her she does not draw away.

\--

The next morning they make love carefully, forlornly, hearts placed firmly in the hands of others but still pensively reaching for a curious what-might-have-been. She revels in the sunlight that washes through the window, a warm and twisting feline as he peels off her clothes. She returns the favor playfully, adventurously, her little hands and busy mouth exploring each layer she uncovers.

Cloud is awkward, nearly virginal in his tentativeness. Yuffie takes control of his hands and guides them to soft, secret places that make her shiver and gasp and moan until he finds the confidence to indulge in her to. She sighs and stirs against his hands, curves and curls beneath his fingers, tips and tangles around his calves.

He doesn’t imagine she is anyone other than who she is. He isn’t sure if she does the same. He tries not to wonder who taught her the shift of her hips that makes him bite his lip. He tries to ignore the nicotine stained fingerprints he imagines he can see on her pale skin like faint tattoos.

He wishes he could feel guilt, regret, shame, and remorse, emotions he treats as old friends. He should be feeling like a betrayer, a traitor to his slapdash family and its lonely queen but he wants this girl, this glow, this bridge to healthy things and all he feels is a heady exaltation, a listing and tilting. The world isn’t perfect on its axis, it isn’t his fault and it doesn’t _matter_ anymore.

For a second, in the brilliant sunlight, her skin is so pale and perfect it is blinding. Then she trembles and he can see her scars, her scratches, her bruises and her bandages, and he trusts her all the more.

Aerith, Tifa, Yuffie…

He loves each one in his graceless, fumbling way, the dream, the ideal and finally the dilemma.

Yuffie giggles in the sunbeams as his hands spread and smooth over her ribs. He does it again just to see her dark eyes dance with mirth. He is as confused by her lack of principles as he is by his own – They risk so many casualties by reaching for one another now – but he _wants_ this, and he will take it before the chance is gone. His life has always been about what other's need. 

She is quicksilver and fleeting in a way that Tifa has long since let go.

Her freedom and her lack of insecurity thrills and intimidates him as she arches her back, writhing and splaying for him. A part of him wishes he could be more like her while another part thanks whatever gods might be listening that he isn’t.

She bites back a breathy moan as he sweeps his fingers over her small breasts, throwing her head back so that her hair drenches the sun bleached pillow in black shadows. He watches her, fascinated and helpless as his fingers paint their own legends over her body.

He used to wonder sometimes if she ever compared herself to her feminine counterparts but understands now that she revels in her own skin, delights in her lanky legs, long arms and skinned elbows. The cocky grin is her badge of honor. Her loping stride is her signature grace.

Being this close to her is like touching fire when his fingers were numb with cold. It won't be good for him in the end but he's helpless to keep himself from it. 

He envies Reno. He tells her so.

“Don’t, please don’t,” she sighs bittersweet, swatting at him as he grazes his lips over her cheek. “He’s my lover and you’re my friend.”

A faint sliver of regret, of curiosity, of conjecture spikes through him, gone before it’s fully understood, dismissed before it’s fully contemplated.

He doesn’t get what she means but holds his silence as she winds her limbs through his and pulls them both over, desperate and damning and dear. She bites her lip just so when he licks her wrist, closes her eyes when he places a kiss on her jutting hip bone.

“Do you ever wonder…?” he cannot help but murmur as he trails his mouth along her thigh.

“I find it’s better not to wonder,” she whispers, trapped beneath his tongue, his words, his strong swordsman hands, and his idle musings.

He is too heavy for her, too filled with emotions and memories, but doesn’t know it. She is fascinated and repelled in this room by the sea, by the hero the child within her always wanted and the woman knew better than to have.

“Does he love you?” he whispers, pulling her tiny frame into his lap and smoothing his tongue over the sweep of her shoulder. She wraps her legs around his waist, making him catch his breath at the electrifying contact.

“I find it’s better not to know,” she replies, distracts him by biting his ear.

“I wish I didn’t know,” he says, thoughts losing, losing, lost, as her skilled lips wander idly along the planes of his chest.

It would be easier not to know how dark Tifa’s eyes become when she pleads with him to stay, begs him not to go, to consider his makeshift family. He loves her so deeply and he wants to run so far from her… and Yuffie, little Yuffie, who wants nothing from him at all and makes it all seem so straightforward when it is anything but.

Yuffie… Yuffie…

He tries to catch the flickering tendrils of his musings, growing further with each wet stroke of her tongue over his skin. He tries, he tries…

She brings him back by tugging hard on a spike of his hair, forcing his mouth open beneath hers and dragging a pleased sigh from his aching throat. His surprised hands wrap around her waist and he explores her mouth. She won’t let him be gentle and bites his lip hard enough to sting.

“You’ll lose her if you keep thinking so hard and not feeling enough,” she warns. “Don’t lose her.”

“I’ll lose you too,” he frowns, speaking without thinking.

She snickers, flicking her quick tongue against a pulse point that makes him groan, his eyes darkening, forgetting the pain he felt at her mirth.

He tries to catch her in his arms, tries to hold her and fails as she slides backwards but is mollified when she drags him along.

“I was never yours to lose,” she laughs lightly and presses her thighs against his hips.

He grips her tightly enough to bruise as he sinks into her body, buries his face in her neck and tries to tell himself her words don’t hurt.

He was never very good at letting go.

She stays with him, meets his steady pace and adds her own flair by wrapping her thin arms around his neck and bringing her lips against his ear. She whispers his name, what she wants from him, what she likes, punishing him with her breathy, girlish voice and teasing words. She gasps with every glide of skin on skin, urges him to go faster, grows frantic when he does. Her long legs wrap around him tightly, her back arching, her nails scratching. She’s wild and forceful and brutal with her intensity. She frightens him, fills him, and exhilarates him.

When she climaxes she meets his eyes brazenly and he is overwhelmed by the desire within them. His own eyes start to slide shut, involuntary as the bliss begins to burn him higher but she calls him name, sneaky and mischievous and demanding and forces him to open himself to her scrutiny as he comes; silent, shaking out of control.

He collapses beside her and for a moment they do nothing but breath. Cloud resists the urge to cling to her, attach himself to her. He knows that if he does he might not let go and more than anything he knows that he can’t have both women, and only one truly wants him at all.

Maybe if I had red hair, he thinks idly. Maybe if I smoked and sneered and grinned like I was going to bite through the hand that feeds me.

He swallows, breathes shallowly and dismisses his useless thoughts. He settles himself by stroking a hand up her arm, over and over and over again.

“Yuffie,” he mumbles. 

But can think of no more to say.

She takes a moment to caress his hair and kiss his temple before she slides out of the bed.

“Where are you going?” he asks, uncertain. He stares at her and knows that there is something desperate and pleading in his blue eyes, in his voice. He suddenly aches inside with compassion for his beloved, wistful Tifa, for all the times he slipped out of her life.

“Duh,” she grins back at him, “If I stay there I might end up head over heels for you, Chocobo-head! I’ve got no time for pillow talk and no use for a broken heart!”

He wants her to come back. He’s glad she’s going. He’s afraid that if she leaves the room it will be forever. He knows it would be better if it were.

“Don’t look at me like that, Cloud,” she smiles. “You’ve got a girl who can give you her whole entire heart! I’ve only got a teensy bit left that isn’t all gobbled up by my country, my people, my Materia… and…”

 _A suit,_ he thinks _, tattoos, lanky limbs, eyes like mine._

She smiles at him again; exuberance shining out so strongly that he feels the swell of it pressing against the air of the room. She nearly unbalances herself as she yanks on her boots. She stands for a moment, looking naively erotic wearing nothing but a musing smile, mussed hair and knee high boots. He swallows, mouth dry.

“Go to sleep,” she urges, soft and teasing. “I would, but ninja’s always sleep with one eye open and I’ve heard that it really creeps people out.”

Too soon she’s dressed, eager to begin running once again from the man she loves and him by proxy. He understands somehow that he could never join her race even if he didn’t love Tifa. He knows he would never catch up.

“I’m glad,” he says, and he is, despite all the horrible strings this attaches to their relationship and all the hurt it would cause if Tifa knew. But she won’t. This is his secret. He has to keep it within himself for the bar maid as much as for himself. He has broken an unspoken pact between the two of them but there was no way he was ever going to cross the line towards her if he had never had anything for himself. A bridge, a link in the chain that as their battered, tattered lives. 

A memory for him and him alone.

“Me too,” she replies, swinging her bag onto her shoulder.

With a last, coy wave, she’s gone.

After a long and tense moment of deliberation, Cloud draws his knees up, sheets sliding over his skin. He can still smell her on the bedding; her clean soap, her warm skin, and his own sweat marking her. He tips his head forward. He feels as if he should grieve.

The door slams open.

“I almost forgot!” she yelps, scandalized.

She pounds across the room, hurls herself against him and kisses him, deep and warm and sweet and sloppy.

When she draws away he stares at her, bemused by the square of sticky pink gum he now feels on his tongue.

“Don’t say I never gave you nothin’,” she chirps as she gently wipes his moist mouth, winks, and tugs on a spike of his pale hair.

Then she’s gone again.

He hadn’t even caught his breath to speak.

The glow, the noise, the glittering luminosity of her energy, she takes these with her as the door slams shut.

But this time he tips his head back and smiles.


	5. Chapter 5

\--

She came to stay at Seventh Heaven a few months later and for a few days Cloud fretted and paced, concerned that he might be unable to hide his secrets from Tifa or from her.

He shouldn’t have worried. She arrives in a squeal of hugs and laughter, whirling from one to the other with barely a pause. When she gets to him she treats him just like Tifa, just like Marlene and Denzel and he’s both relieved and annoyed that she makes it look so easy.

And it isn’t long before Reno finds her. This is his city to, after all.

\--

Cloud hadn’t meant to spy on them. At first he had thought only of stopping them, of hiding him from her, of shielding her from him, he truly didn’t know. But, he stopped on the rooftop where they couldn’t see him and he could watch them both.

He is repulsed and fascinated by the dramatics, the intensity, the vicious words and accusations that tumble from their mouths and the blinding passion that thrums through the air between them.

“This isn’t a goddamn game!”

Reno’s voice is caught by the breeze and dragged so close to Cloud he could have been standing beside him. He sounds tense and enraged.

“Seems pretty silly to me,” Yuffie bites out, flippant, annoyed.

He can read the tension in her muscles even if she’s standing like she hasn’t a care in the world. He watches her hands flex. He sees Reno pacing frantically, all suit and red hair and cigarette waving in his gesturing hands. He stops and looks at her for a long, anguished moment.

“Don’t,” the Turk groans, furious. “Don’t fucking _do_ this to me! Not now.”

Yuffie snorts, tapping her foot. “Do what? Carry on living? What am I supposed to do, just hang around until you’re ready to come _with_ me? Should I be like Tifa here, sitting around with a couple children waiting for somebody who doesn’t want to come home?”

Cloud jerks as if she has struck him and shame knifes him in the gut. He can’t drag himself away to lick his wounds yet though and he nearly steps forward as Reno lunges at Yuffie, slamming her against the wall so hard that her body bounces. He pins her there with his thin white hands.

“You bitch,” he moans in a voice Cloud has never heard from him before. It’s completely unlike the lazy, casual redhead. It’s filled with misery and loneliness and a kind of agony Cloud can only imagine showing others in his deepest nightmares. “You heartless, thoughtless brat… how could you? How could you do this to _me_?”

Cloud wonders if he knows.

“It’s not just you,” she cries as he clutches at her and her tears are sudden and startling, a shattering kind of explosion of wailing and water and wounds. “”It’s us! It’s us! _It’s both of us_!”

“Stop running,” Reno groans and he drops his head against her neck. “You’ve got to stop running. I’m too tired to keep chasing you.”

And then he’s kissing her, hard and relentless and bitter, and she’s kissing him back just as fiercely. Reno’s cupping her face in both hands, tender and ruthless, bending so far over the little ninja that Cloud thinks he might snap in two. He’s still pinning her to the wall and she’s still letting him, and she’s scrabbling at his chest and his back and his sides like she wants to climb into his skin. Her tears haven’t stopped.

Cloud can’t look away, broken and stunned and voyeuristic as Reno wrenches on her clothing, tears at her hair, bites at her body and she responds just as violently. She scratches whatever skin is in reach, nips his lips till they look red and raw. He doesn’t dare call it love but in its own twisted fashion it’s the most truthful adoration he’s ever seen.

 _I love you,_ Reno is cursing, over and over and over. _I love you. I love you. I love you._

Cloud can’t bear to watch any more when Yuffie whimpers the same to him. He turns, feeling raw somehow, an exposed nerve vibrating in the air. He slips away. 

\--

He finds her hours later, sitting perfectly still on the guest bed in her room after Tifa has taken the children grocery shopping. Cloud would have come, but Yuffie had made her excuses with no expression in her eyes and it scared him. He had met Tifa’s questioning eyes but could only shrug.

He stands outside her door for far too long, wondering if she is crying on the other side. He strains to hear anything in the quiet, but there is nothing and so he knocks.

She tells him to come in and he opens the door and finds her on the bed.

Now he is hesitant, knowing what had transpired on the roof and unsure of what to say in the face of it. When he walks across the room and sits beside her he can still see the red welts and scratches left by Reno’s nails. He takes in her huge lost eyes, her forlorn little mouth, his mind swimming with images of the twosome on the roof and his own knowledge of her body.

He looks at her, sitting on the bed in nothing but a soft beige towel, legs on the floor, fingers fisted into the bedspread. Her hair is damp and loose, and she smells strongly of fresh soap The room is chilly. She hasn’t bothered with the heat.

“Are you cold?” he says carefully.

She swallows.

“Nah, I’ve been dressing in next to nothing for so many years I think I’m part Shiva,” she says hollowly.

Cloud remembers the echo of those words from years ago, on the same roof that’s killing him to think of now.

“Cloud?” she murmurs, turning her wide, stricken stare to him. “I can’t run forever.”

He keeps his eyes on hers, searching and thinking of some wisdom to offer the broken little ninja. He thinks of the desperate, thwarted hunger on Reno’s face. Maybe the redhead finally sees that he doesn’t truly want to run.

“Is,” he says hesitantly, “is he done… chasing?”

“No,” she whispers, “I don’t think so. He says so but I know him.”

They sit for a time, and slowly, she leans her damp head against his shoulder. A friend seeking a friend. She doesn’t cry, just stares blankly at the floor. Cloud frowns. He would rather she shout and scream and throw things. She isn’t meant for this sorrowful silence. He tries to imagine what she would say if their positions were reversed, but feels stupid and inept.

She turns her face against the shoulder bared by his turtleneck. Her nose grazes his skin and his thoughts escape him.

“What are you doing here?” she asks him quietly, drawing away.

Cloud doesn’t know, and yet he does know, and he can’t find any words in his suddenly empty mind to tell her what he wants.

“I saw you,” he rasps, “on the roof. With him.”

She meets his eyes steadily, a hint of an embarrassed blush filling her cheeks with heat.

Cloud looks down at his lap, clenches his fists. Unclenches them.

He wants to let go. He wants to unleash. He wants to heal. He wants what he’d seen on the roof even if it’s only once. Someday – soon – when he makes love to Tifa for the first time, he promises that it will be tender and gentle and soft. He can’t bear to think of the violent passion Yuffie and Reno had displayed and Tifa in the same sentence. He is frightened by the thought that if he asked that of her she would be repulsed. He is more afraid that if she asked that of him he would be unable to give it to her.

He had placed her on a pedestal for so long, the thought of her as spoiled and human offends him.

“Tifa… She doesn’t… I want…” His mouth is dry, his quiet voice crackling with tension and the flustered need to be understood.

A spark of mischievous curiosity lights her eyes and he feels something loosening in his chest, relieved by the flash of normal Yuffie.

“You and him…I don’t know how,” he breathes, pleading. “I don’t know _how_ to be what you are.”

“You don’t need to be,” she says, concern thick in her voice. She slides in front of him on her knees, wraps her hands around his upper arms and her eyes plead.

He blinks, because for a moment she was Aerith, she was Tifa, she was Yuffie all in one.

“You don’t need to be _me_. You _don’t_ need to be him. You just need to be _you_ ,” she explains simply. And it should be the most obvious truth ever but it isn't. 

Silently he stares, remembering Reno’s pain at her hands, recalling the sadness in her eyes by the sea, reliving the warmth of his fingers gliding on her sunny skin, her silky mouth wildly capturing his before she darted out of reach.

She looks so earnest and so honest and so sure before him now. Her face is drawn and pale but instead of sadness behind her smile there is happiness.

Happiness.

“What if I don’t like who I’ve become?” he mumbles.

Because inside he’s always been the cold and silent winter longing for an absent spring. And summer darts and flits before him. And gentle autumn waits.

Yuffie shrugs, laughter dancing once more in her gaze. She breaks in one moment and heals in the next. He wishes he could see her endless seams, study the glue between them.

“Tough luck, misery britches! The rest of us _love_ you lots and lots just because you’re you! Even,” she nudges him conspiratorially, “enough to eat Tifa’s awful cooking and pretend we totally adore it.”

She pulls a face, pretending to shudder. “Unless she makes that fish casserole again. I don’t even love _myself_ enough for that.”

“Hey,” she asks abruptly, excitement lighting her face as she scuttles over to her bag and begins digging. “Want a piece of gum?”

“Sure,” he replies, amused by her endless stretching towards a happiness he cannot see and is uncertain he ever will.

He is content for now. That is enough.

And so he smiles for her, and for himself, and she smiles back as she hands him a piece of gum, her fingers warm against his for a long moment.

\--

Later, he sees them beneath the streetlights and she’s wrapped in Reno’s lanky limbed embrace. Covered in his lengthy angles and planes she looks unbearably small. His face is bent tightly into her neck. His red ponytail is falling down over her white shoulder. They look awkward jammed together so tightly, like two puzzle pieces trying desperately to fit with little success.

Reno’s swaying just slightly, tall and thin and pale, hunched over her like a demon in distress.

As Cloud watches, her slender arms creep up, up, up, around his shoulders. She stands on her tiptoes and leans her forehead into his shoulder.

He can see her expression now. It’s the secret, dreamy face of a child who has just found some great, wild treasure and intends to keep it. It’s the soft, gentle face of a girl who knows where she belongs and is blissfully content. It’s the bittersweet, pained face of a woman afraid and desperately in love.

And he slips away back into Seventh Heaven and lets her go, accepting that she was never his to hold but always his to watch. He had broken the rules once and touched a bit of her warmth but the sparks that ignite her aren’t his to command and seeing them together makes him understand that together, Yuffie and Reno may be mismatched pieces but they are both of the same wild puzzle. They long for sharp edged silver days, snapping jaws and baited breath between gentle moments. They grasp and tear at the world around them, scrabbling for all they can in the little time they have. They are hungry in the dangerous way of wild things, and he has had enough of that life.

Cloud is still unsure of what he wants. He wanders daze hazy and silent, the world sloping and curving and rising around him while he picks his unsure path and waits for it to become clear.

His time with her was borrowed and fleeting and always stolen, but he is glad of it.

Faith that she is strong enough to fight her own battles no matter who wins, walk her own paths wherever they may lead her, and find her own ending be it happy or sad flows through him like clean, pure water. He drinks it in.

Tifa is behind the counter, carefully heaping an extra portion of whipped cream on Denzel’s ice cream with a wink, pressing her finger to her grinning lips. Cloud watches her for a moment, thankful for every day she’s given him, grateful for her boundless patience and her endless capacity to love. She sends Denzel on his way one heaping bowl heavier and waves him over when she catches sight of him standing by the door.

“Where’s Yuffie?” she asks curiously. “I figured she’d be tackling me to the floor as soon as I broke out the ice cream!”

Cloud shrugs, smiling slightly. “Around, I guess.”

Catching his secrets in her knowing gaze, she props a hand of her graceful hip and cocks her head to the side.

“Okay, spill, Cloud! What’s gotten into you?”

She studies him with happy eyes, bemused as he takes a brightly wrapped package from his pocket and unwraps it

“Gum?” he asks lightly, proffering a compact little square of pink towards her.

She takes it without hesitation, popping the square onto her tongue and leaning across the counter as if waiting to hear a secret.

“So what’s up?” she asks, eyes bright.

Warmed, he smiles widely.

\--

The End


End file.
